Jo lives in a small town in southern Japan. She lives with her two children and Japanese husband and is learning more everyday about the world of Japanese agriculture and culture.

Friday, June 22, 2007

Playing with vegetables

A while ago a friend asked me to send her a box of vegetables on a regular basis. I have been playing around with the idea and as she is coming to visit this afternoon with some other friends I offered to make anyone interested a "trial box" - more for me to try it out than anything else. So this morning while it was raining I started to assemble the contents for today's box. I had so much fun! I am really interested in trying to increase the volume I can provide in the future and some of the concepts I would like to put into the boxes are...

Making them as environmentally friendly as possible. Of course the vegetables are organically grown, but I am playing around with different ways to package the vegetables using recycled materials. My daughter showed me how to make great little boxes from newspaper and advertsing paper so that is a start. I have also started another blog (just for fun) with the description of the vegetables and herbs contained in the box and ways they can be used - the theory is that this will eliminate the need for including any printed material in the box. For anyone who can read Japanese... the blog address is: Josgardenjapan it is just in the construction phase really....

Including some kind of vegetable which most people here have never tried before. I grow many "unusual" vegetables here which are suited to Japanese cooking, but as no one knows how to use them I can never sell them. By adding cooking ideas to the blog I hope they will discover new vegetables and increase the sales of "unusual veges"! This week there are zucchinis and silverbeet.

Including a "special jar" with each box which contains a handmade item such as muesli, gherkins, salad dressing, pesto, jam etc. The theory is that the jar will be returned and refilled with something new each time and if there was something that they particularly liked they could purchase larger quantities of it later. This week it is Jo's muesli.....

Including some fresh herbs in each box with ideas of how to use them. In the right season including a seedling of fresh herbs so they can grow them themselves. Many people in Japan grow herbs, but have no idea how to use them. This week there is fresh basil and a herb tea set (lemon verbena, lemon grass and lemon balm).

The boxes will contain seasonal vegetables and therefore the purchaser cannot actually choose the contents, but can tell me if there are any items they really don't need or want.

Now all I need to do is work out a way to transport the boxes, grow a greater volume, spread the word about the boxes and of course sleep in between!